Getting about in Japan

Japan is a developed country, perhaps the most developed of all Asian countries. Nonetheless it is astounding how virtually no English or any other international language of communication is used anywhere, even at the countries most important tourism sites. For getting around this means spending ages trying to “read” Japanese, which isn't made easier by the fact that there's three separate alphabets – Kanji, developed from Chinese characters, and two other phonetic alphabets, one for imported words, the other for Japanese. Saying that, it's not all that difficult really, just makes a pain of reading timetables and menus... But considering that its likely someone will be able to speak a few words of English in the most remote villages of Vietnam and Thailand, let alone major tourism destinations... I guess tourism is a very small part of the Japanese economy.

Also, something I've not been able to figure out – when you take a bus, the driver/conductor talks for ages, one time 15 minutes... but about what? To me it sounds like he's repeating the words “welcome” and “please” over and over again.